AOW #18: Supreme Court Set to Decide National Debate on Gay Marriage

This weeks article of the week is on Gay Marriage, and how the Supreme Court set to decide a National Debate on it. This article really kind of made me angry, and any subject like this usually does. I do not think it should be illegal for same-sex marriage. You cannot help who you love rather it be the same sex as you or not, love is love. It really makes me mad when I see gay people being judged for it.

Why make them feel bad about themselves for being with someone that makes them happy? They should have the same equal rights as straight couples that get married. I do not see why the court feels the need to have to take so much time of their lives to argue over if they should pass same-sex marriage or not. According to this article they set aside 2 ½ hours last April just to argue over it. To me this is discrimination. I am by no means gay, but I do have quite a few close family members that are, and i love them to death.

I would never treat them any different because of who they love. Can you imagine how they feel having to fight to marry who they want to be happy with? Just let them have peace. As the article said “The outcome could be a landmark ruling giving gay and lesbian couples a right to marry nationwide under the constitution’s protections for individual liberty and equal treatment”(Savage 1). I think this is how it should have been all along.

Why are they just now bringing up the constitution's protections for equal treatment? Especially after all these years of nip picking and fighting marriage for gays. I know some it has to do with religion and Christians fighting it, but if you are anywhere near a christian or a religious person then you aren't suppose to judge people and should treat everyone equally.Why not just make it legal and let them live a happy life?

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AOW #17: Three Articles About Charlie Hebdo

This weeks Article Of The Week was really confusing to me. I guess Charlie Hebdo created a cartoon in a magazine making fun of Muhammad. So on Wednesday January 7th, three masked men came to the Paris office where the magazine Charlie Hebdo was and shot and killed 12 people and 2 of those 12 were police officers. I guess this is not the first time this has happened, about 4 years ago they were firebombed for making fun of Muhammad. Yes, everybody has “freedom of speech” but they should be prepared that if you are going to make fun of someone and put it in a magazine then you should be ready to suffer the consequences from your actions.

ISIS believes that no one should make fun of or talk badly about Muhammad. It was said in the article that a London based editor sent an email and said “It should be “the best it can be” but asked staff to question whether the terrorist attack was “really an attack on free speech” (Jenkins 1). I really truly believe that it most definitely was an attack on free speech, I mean they did kill all those people because of what Charlie Hebdo said in the magazine. I don’t blame them for being angry, but to kill someone over something they said is taking to the extreme.

That is insane! I agree, that the cartoon drawing was not that bad, it is definitely how they said it. When you make fun of people and say stuff like that you should be prepared to be attacked. It is good that they apologized for making fun and promised to never do it again, but it is a little too late for that since they already pissed them off. Now that these people are angry, they probably are not going to give up this battle. Obviously, they really hate being laughed at and if they knew that after all the other times then why continue to make fun of?

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AOW #16: Eating too much added sugar may be killing you

This weeks article of the week is about how eating too much added sugars in food could be killing people. We all know that all the bad sweets we love to eat is bad for us. Sodas, cakes, cookies, and any kind of candy you eat has so much unhealthy added sugars in it. People do not realize that when they go to the doctor most causes of diabetes, high blood pressure, and most commonly obesity is caused from eating too much of added sugars that's in food. It would not hurt for people in the United States to stay on a healthy diet and actually replace all these sweets with fruits and vegetables.

I can honestly see why obesity is so bad in the United States, just one can of the regular can of soda contains over 140 calories of added sugars. That is insane, imagine how many cans a soda a day just one person drinks? All Americans diets consist of anymore is sugar-sweetened foods like ice creams, cakes, candies, etc.. I think it all starts in their early childhood years because all you see is little kids walking around eating this kind of stuff anymore. I think that the companies that distribute and make this stuff should be made to make it with healthier alternatives besides all those added sugars.

Most people’s daily 2,000 calorie diet is taken up from all the added sugars, over 300 calories a day is just from added sugars in our food. If people would just learn to eat healthy, it would help get rid of all these unwanted added sugars in their body. As stated in the USA Today’s article “People who consumed seven or more servings a week of sugar-sweetened beverages were 29% higher risk of death from heart disease than those who consumed one serving or less”(Hellmich 2). I honestly believe it, when people are consuming all those added sugars and fattening foods they are taking away from their nutrients in their body. They have a higher risk of getting blocked arteries in their hearts from all these added sugars which will cause problems with your heart like heart disease. Eating unhealthy has become such a problem, not many people follow proper diets in this world anymore.

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AOW #15: On a Comet 10 years away, Philae Conks Out, Maybe for Good

This weeks article was kind of confusing to me.I guess it all started 10 years ago from scientist and NASA sending some kind of vehicle made for space to go up and transmit data and certain photos to earth to answer some of scientists questions and observe data from the comet. This “vehicle” is battery operated and ran by rechargeable batteries but the batteries only recharge by sunlight. I do not think this was a very good idea because what if there was not any sunlight near it for awhile, did they not think it wouldn’t get stuck and run out of battery? As of November, It went into idle mode from not having enough charge on the battery. Scientist think all their equipment and such they create to send up there is going to work what they don’t realize is they aren’t perfect. They can’t do everything to be sure that the equipment they send up to space is going to function properly or not. As scientist said in the article that it was supposed to have 7 hours of sunlight per day. How could they guarantee that it was going too? I would have made it with another back up plan when there was no sun around it. As stated in the article “The probe’s landing didn’t go as planned this week, after Philae detached from the Rosetta orbiter” (Brumfield 1). Now that it has detached from the orbiter, it has to run on its own now which caused it to go to the wrong spot and now has no direct sunlight to it. Without this it won’t work correctly to give scientist the information they need. So they have decided to try one last thing to fix it and that was to send commands that will supposedly rotate the “vehicles” body so that it can fix the solar panels. I think that it is going to take more than this to fix the problem.

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AOW 14: After a concussion, when can teens return to the football field?

This weeks article is about concussions from football especially in teenagers. I honestly do not think people realize how serious a concussion can be, it is nothing to be messing around with. I think that parents, kids, and coaches do not take it serious enough, I feel as if they think it is just a minor injury. What they do not realize is that a concussion is a traumatic brain injury that could cause severe brain damage such as memory loss if not taken seriously. I think it is absolutely ridiculous that they send the students back on the field within 7-10 days with still having a concussion. They are supposed to out a minimum of six weeks. All the coaches care about is winning the game not their players safety. I do not think minors should be playing football because their brains are still maturing unlike adults. “Nearly 1,500 high school football players in Missouri suffered concussion in 2012, and most of them returned to action within two weeks, according to Missouri high school officials” (Kansas City Star 1). If Missouri has that many football players with concussions than why do they take it so lightly? They only keep their players off the field 24 hours, how crazy is that? You should never send a player back on the field until they are cleared. If they go back on the field too soon, the player has a higher risk of getting a second concussion. The second concussion is always more dangerous, how would Missouri coaches feel if they put them back on the field too soon and they would die or have permanent brain damage from a second concussion. I think that it is a good idea that they are starting to take concussions more seriously and are starting to do testings.

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AOW #13: What Students Really Need to Hear

The article I read this week was really inspiring to me. I have always felt like not many of the teachers cared about their students until after reading this article written by a teacher who really showed his emotions and stressed his feelings about how he feels about his students. Thanks to him I have changed my perspective view about some teachers, but no matter what some still will never care. Being a high school student tends to get very stressful especially as you began to start your senior year, so it is always nice to know that the teachers care about us and want us to succeed in life. I definitely agree that we should be taught more everyday life skills in school instead of the pointless math, spanish, and other curriculums that we will never use after high school, i mean unless you are going to be living in a foreign country or something.

Honestly, why should teachers worry themselves like crazy about students who do not care enough about themselves to try to do their work and be successful in school. If they think not doing their work or even trying matters then let them be failures and worry about the students that do care and try. I always try to push myself to do the very best I can do in school with my work, but sometimes I do tend to give up to easy. School is very stressful and there are times I could use some encouragement to pick myself back up and continue to keep trying.

As the article said “Life will let you die alone, depressed, and poor if you can’t man or woman up enough to deal with hardship” (Mielke 2). This could not of been said any better, If one can’t own up to his or her mistakes and be able to continue to try harder to be successful than you’re going to live a miserable life without anything to show for.

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AOW #12: The Nerd Science of Campaigning

So apparently there is a “nerd” science campaigning now where they go through data. analyze behavior, and pretty much just persuade us people to cast ballots and vote. I did not even know there was such a campaign until I read this article. I guess this science campaign is how we get all of our popular votes. This campaigning is how all of our presidents has won their elections, especially Obamas campaign in 2012.

“With advanced analytics and targeting, the Obama team in 2012 narrow casted its message to persuadable voters-- on facebook, on television, on Pandora, on well-placed billboards, on doorsteps, wherever-- and tilted swing state electorates in their favor” (Hamby 1). Oh really? I never once remember seeing any kind of campaign advertisements on social media or pandora with any Obama campaigns nor did he even try or care enough to come to door steps and deliver campaign signs. He did waste money on television campaign ads because I remember seeing them.

As much as technology has advanced nowadays, most of campaigning is done through the internet especially social media and believe it or not it has caught young people between the ages of 18-35 to start voting in the elections. They target the younger generation because they know advertising on social media and such is going to get our attention so we’ll go vote. It honestly has, we are the reason most of these idiots get elected.

What I did not know is there is a business that is getting paid millions of dollars to help all these presidents and such campaign for the elections and to persuade people to change their minds about a president so us people will vote for them. This is the stupidest thing I have ever heard of. Why would some company get paid that much to help campaign and advertise on the internet for presidents? In my opinion, this election stuff has always been irrational.

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